


Four times batcat kiss in S5 and the one time they don't.

by bensreylo



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: 4 + 1, F/M, Post-Canon, as per usual, they are a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 08:41:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17138600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bensreylo/pseuds/bensreylo
Summary: “I thought I killed you.” He steps closer, holding her gaze with an intensity she had grown familiar with. The same way he looked at her on a rooftop, and then another one after that. A time when he leaned in, kissed her, and ended with her bleeding out on his coffee table.





	Four times batcat kiss in S5 and the one time they don't.

**i.**

“I thought I killed you.” He steps closer, holding her gaze with an intensity she had grown familiar with. The same way he looked at her on a rooftop, and then another one after that. A time when he leaned in, kissed her, and ended with her bleeding out on his coffee table.

Before now, she had hoped that the drink Bruce forced down her throat _would_ kill her. How she wished Jeremiah had pressed the barrel of the gun against her ribcage instead of her waist. Who was she without the use of her legs? She didn’t care to know. When she grabbed for the knife, her only plan was to finish the job no one else could. Bruce stopped her. She had hated him for it.

 “You’ll have to try a little harder,” she smirks up at him. “You did just the opposite.”

Bruce is silent for a beat. It’s something he does often, when he’s overcome with thoughts and there’s too much to say so he just _stares_. Sometimes she did the same. She wonders if he got that from her.

“Hey,” she softens, something _she_ often does since they met. “I’m fine, Bruce. More than fine.” It was true. Bruce didn’t know it, but she heard his cried protests as he was escorted from the room so doctors could evaluate the sudden shock her body convulsed into. The liquid she had reluctantly swallowed had turned her world dark for only a minute, then everything made sense - as if the body she was in suddenly _fit._

She was used to saving him. Too often she was breaking her rule of putting only herself first to help him out of whatever nonsense was plaguing him that day, and now here we was. Saving her. In more ways than one.

 “Bruce,” she tries again when his eyes start flicking back and forth between hers, as if he can’t decide which green iris he wants to stare into. She reaches out to poke his chest. “Say something.”

Before she can retract her hand, he reaches up and traps her fingers against his coat. And in his way of saying something, he swoops down like a bird and captures her mouth with his. _He must be going through it,_ she muses and smiles against the kiss. He pecks at her thinned lips, wanting her to respond, and she does. She always does.

 

**ii.**

Selina perches on Gordon’s desk at the overcrowded GCPD. She spies one officer face down on a desk, head tucked under her arms and snoring softly. From her vantage point, she can also see Bruce arguing animatedly with Bullock. She knows it’s about her. About what she did.

He lifts his head, as if he can feel her eyes on him and catches her look. She flashes him her patented _are we done yet_  face and is rewarded when he strides away from Bullock mid-sentence to where she waits.

“This isn’t a game, Selina.”

“Of course not. Games are fun and I’m stuck at the GCPD.”

“You killed someone.”

“He attacked me.”

“We stopped him -”

“He _attacked_ me,” she swings one leg over the other and leans back on her palms. “Why does it matter? Everyone is killing everyone now, the laws don’t apply in ‘no man's land’.”

Bruce huffs heavily, the way he does before he’s about to lecture her. “It matters because it wasn’t just self defence, Selina. You stabbed him multiple times even after he was dead. That’s not like you.”

“You really think I haven’t used my claws before?” She thinks back to the man on the bus, the one who was driving all the other unwanted kids ‘upstate’ to be used and abused. She holds up her gloved hand, the light catches on the metal claws she had fastened to the leather. “This _is_ me. You’re worked up for nothing. Can we go now?”

He stands between her and the barrier around Gordon’s desk, expression hardened and appearing as if he’s run a marathon. She has the silly urge to pull him closer. He opens his mouth to retort with something probably about humanity, _most likely_ about how she can’t make her own justice, even in this world, so she acts on her feeling and grabs him by the collar. His jaw ticks.

 _I’ve got you wrapped around my pinkie_ , she thinks back to that day in Arkham, when he thought he had manipulated her for once. And yet he came running into an insane asylum to make sure she was still alive.

“Am I a monster, Bruce?”

“No.” His answer is immediate and enough for her. _Always have._ Nothing has changed.

Without moving her upper body, she pulls him by the collar until he’s forced to step between her legs. His hands grip the table’s edge as his knees hit the desk.

“Am I being arrested?”

“No,” his eyes drop to her mouth briefly. “Only because I insisted you were acting in self defence. Bullock wanted you thrown in with the others.” The _others_ being the wannabe criminals that attempted to take a piece of Gotham for themselves. There were a dozen, maybe a bit more in the two joined cells down by the snoring officer’s desk.

“How cozy.”

“Selina -”

“Stop talking,” she surges forward. She feels his body tense, wanting to resist and continue on with his lecture but within seconds he relaxes into her grip. When he does, she shoves him back and taps a clawed finger against his chin. She smirks when he recoils.

 

**iii.**

“That was reckless, misguided and plain stupid!” Bruce shouts as he storms into the kitchen of Wayne Manor, her following five paces behind. He had been shaking on the car ride home, even more so when she stretched in her seat and hissed when the stitches in her arm pulled.

“Misguided? He shot me, Bruce.” She climbs onto the tabletop and winces as her arm buckles. His eyes flash in her direction and he strides to the freezer to grab ice. “You knew I was going to go after Jeremiah eventually. Why are you _so_ angry?”

He slams the door shut harder than she expected. “Why? Did you just ask me _why_?” He unfurls a towel and dumps a handful of ice onto the cloth. “I almost lost you to that maniac once before. How do you think I felt when he called to let me know my _cat_ paid him a visit? When he told me your blood stained his suit?” He thrusts the wrapped ice in her direction.

She takes it, gently. Her ungloved fingers linger on his. She knew he would be upset, furious even - and that’s why she neglected to invite him along for the fun. Doing things _his_ way wasn’t going to cut it. This was her fight, not his, and she didn’t think she could stand to hear him preach about the laws and justice when the asshole who rendered her paralyzed was at her mercy. Instead of saying that, she presses the ice to her stitches and nudges his hip with her knee.

“You got me out of there. I’m fine.”

It takes the edge out of him, but he’s still breathing harshly.

“Bruce,” she tries again. After she shot Jeremiah in his stomach and pulled Ecco’s mask off, he cut her arm with a concealed knife. But she didn’t care if he lived, or died. She just wanted him to feel what she felt, to _suffer._ The gash in her arm was worth that. “He only scratched me. I did worse.”

His lips twitch at that. She sees the small hint of pride on his face and she beams. _Gotcha._ “Go on, tell me how awesome I am.”

“Too soon, Selina.”

“Oh, come on! I want to hear all about your _cat_ who one upped the clown of Gotham all by herself.”

Bruce shakes his head and places a hand on either side of her hips. “You’re insufferable, you know that?”

“You love it.” She uses her finger to tip his chin up until he’s forced to look into her eyes.

Bruce finally smiles at her and she almost gasps; it’s been too long since she’s seen it. Moreover, too long since she’s seen him look at her as if he adores her. Once, maybe. When they stood on a rooftop and she, once again, came to his rescue. _Does this mean you are my girlfriend?_ She rolls her eyes at the memory, but smiles. _Shut up_.

“I do.” He says with far too much emotion, and she’s not ready to unpack that quite yet, so she throws an arm around his neck and brings him as close as the space will possibly allow. He meets her halfway and they kiss until Alfred awkwardly shuffles into the kitchen to remind them _‘doors open, lights on’._

 

**iv.**

Bane has her in a chokehold. Almost every criminal in Gotham wants a piece of Bruce, and apparently the way to get to him is through _her._ She wishes it surprised her at this point, but after being used by her own mother for Wayne money and being shot as a way to push Bruce towards insanity, why would today’s events be anything new? She thrashes against his hold. Bruce stands on the edge, searching for a way to free her without Selina getting her neck snapped.

She thinks of the ways she could hurt Bane. A swift kick backwards could hit where it counts most, maybe clawing at his eyes - even with the mask on, she might manage to blind him. Before she can act, Bruce throws his entire weight on Bane’s arm to loosen the grip around her throat. When there’s enough wiggle room, she rolls out of the way and Bruce takes her spot. She crouches, watching as the two struggle. She could just walk away, be _free_ from being used as a tool to hurt poor little rich boy Bruce Wayne. But she doesn’t. She creeps along the edge as Bruce had done and waits for an opportunity.

“Get out of here!” He shouts at her and she scoffs, loud. She valued her life more than she cared to admit, even during her time in the hospital, it hurt her to make the decision to grab a knife and attempt to finish what Jeremiah had started. She needed legs to survive and survival was in her blood; leaving Bruce to die was not.

“ _Selina_ -”

“Shut up, Bruce! I’m not leaving.” She makes eye contact with Bane and he sends Bruce flying backwards. She lunges at him, swiping at his exposed throat and narrowly missing when he spins out of reach. Bruce rolls on the ground out of sight and she grasps the handle of her whip. She doesn’t get a chance to use it as four GCPD cars come screeching around the corner.

Moments later, they’re standing off to the side as Gordon barks orders at his officers. Some want to pursue Bane in the direction he had run off in, others want to continue patrolling the area. She crosses her arms against the cold.

“I thought you were going to die,” Bruce explains for a third time and she rolls her eyes, refusing to look at him. She was pissed at being used against him, again, but also for being expected to run away while he saved her, like she was some sort of damsel and wasn’t constantly coming to _his_ rescue. He had never run then, why should she?

“I only -”

“You told me to stay out of it once, do you remember?” She whirls on him, unable to keep up the silent treatment. “With Sonny. He shoved my face into a bag of weed and you _valiantly_ took the beating meant for me. I knew how to handle him, I was going to talk him down and you just kept pushing. And what happened? Tell me the rest.”

He doesn’t. He only stares.

“ _I_ stitched your face up in the place that _I_ found for us.” She pokes a clawed finger into his rigid chest. “I am not useless and don’t you ever tell me to run from a fight again. I know when I can win and when I can’t. It’s _you_ that lacks that judgment. Or maybe you just don’t care.”

Bruce’s jaw clenches.

“Why are you the only one who gets to worry?” She hisses and hates that her eyes are watering. “I’m also scared that you’re going to die, you idiot. Do I need to spell out how much you mean to me? Huh? _Do I?”_

Wisely, he says nothing. Nothing he could say would stop her from yelling at him some more. Instead, he softly nods and folds his arms around her. She was shaking. From the cold, or the anger, she wasn’t sure but she breathes heavily against his neck, letting him comfort her this once.

She wonders at what point they had reached this level of intimacy, at what point she stopped caring about it. She remembers how she froze when he leaned towards her in his car, how she waited several moments to brush her thumb over his knuckle when he took her hand, how she couldn’t move when he was crouched on top of her in the diner and breathing her air. Now she was pressing her face into his shoulder and wrapping her arms tightly around him, beneath his coat.

“Everything okay here?” Gordon steps into her sight and she sighs. Bruce handles him, keeping one arm around her waist as he explains how they just happened to be in the neighbourhood when Bane came barreling down the street. All a lie, of course. But she doesn’t interrupt. Gordon didn’t need to know that Bruce was looking for trouble, and Bruce didn’t need to know she was sniffing out Oswald for her newest vendetta.

After Gordon leaves and they’re back to doing their own patrol down the streets, Selina shoves him into a flipped car. He gasps from the suddenness of it and before he can say another _damn word_ , she silences him the best way she knows how. He pulls back after a few seconds, lips swollen.

“I take it that I’m forgiven?”

“Shut up.”

 

**v.**

Ten years later, Selina stands on a rooftop and plays with a diamond necklace she plucked from her most recent burglary. She was waiting for him. It’s been over a month, verging on two, since she last saw him. They had danced, they had drank, they ended up in his bed. The usual for them. They were in an official unofficial relationship - mostly because she hated labels, “boyfriend and girlfriend” didn’t seem like good enough words to describe what they were.

“ _Selina._ ”

“Took you long enough,” she grins at him over her shoulder. “I was thinking perhaps Gordon might beat you to it this time.”

“Is a necklace truly worth it?”

Bruce eases down from the ledge, barely making a sound as his feet hit the ground. He wasn’t as stealthy as her, not yet. She liked to let him pretend though.

She holds up the necklace, the diamonds glitter under the moonlight. “Wrong question, Bats. _This_ is worth quite a lot. Don’t you think it’ll look nice on me?” In truth, she had no intention of wearing it. She’d cut the little diamonds out and sell them piece by piece. But she couldn’t help the thrill that ran through her as she teased Bruce, especially with his mask on.

“Anything looks nice on you.”

Her mood sours. “Don’t patronize me.”

“You asked a question, I answered.” “

The wrong question, remember? What you should be asking is _why_ I stole it.”

He says nothing and she sighs, wishing she could punch the younger version of her that only ever wanted Bruce to shut up because every time he opened his mouth he said the wrong thing. Now it was a blessing to hear more than a few words at a time from him when he was suited up.

She goes on, “I stole it because it’s the only way I get to see you anymore. I think a relationship requires more than this, don’t you?” She distinctly remembers a time when he had an attitude with her for being late on their first official date. He cooked their meal, even baked a cake. Her heart breaks a little. “Tell me the truth, Batman. Is this it? Are we done?”

“We’re never done.” He pauses, as if he will say more and then strides towards her. Her stomach erupts in nerves. An annoying affect he still has on her. Then his arms envelop her in a bone crushing hug she had been craving for too long. “I’ve really missed you.”

She softens against him and cradles his cowled head to hers. “I know you’re busy, but I would appreciate no longer having to chase my boyfriend around the Gotham rooftops, got it?” These days she had more luck finding him in the streets than she did at his manor where she spent many nights waiting for him to walk through the doors and many nights more fussing with Alfred in the batcave.

“So I _am_ your boyfriend.”

“Shut up.”

“Give me the necklace.”

“An ulterior motive? Wish I was surprised.” She dances out of his grasp and dangles the necklace next to her face. “I have a living to make, Batman. Since when did you care about me stealing anything? It’s _work,_ remember?”

He rolls his eyes. “I need it for one minute, then it’s yours.”

She tosses it to him. He catches it effortlessly and she smirks, remembering the scared kid that hesitated jumping across a rooftop to chase after her but doing it anyway. She’s so lost in memories that the sight of him popping one of the diamonds loose barely startles her, until he holds the necklace out for her to take and she spots one missing.

“You owe me a thousand for that, _thief_.”

“I’ll pay you later. Are you busy?”

“Depends on what you have in mind.”

His eyes shift down to her mouth, then her neck, then the rest of her body and she flushes. He moves closer, in a way that’s all too familiar and she will never tire of, but she has yet another lesson to teach him. She stops him before he can touch her and his mask tightens as confusion sets in.

“Turns out I _am_ busy; I have diamonds to sell. I’ll come to collect my money and more sometime next week.” She leans forward and he meets her halfway, eager to steal a kiss but she pats the side of his mask instead. “See you around, Bats.”

A month later, he surprised her with the diamond and a proposal.

A year later, she finally said yes.


End file.
